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User Reviews for: Baby Driver

AndrewBloom
9/10  7 years ago
[9.3/10] At first blush, *Baby Driver* writer-director Edgar Wright and fellow director Wes Anderson don’t seem like a natural pairing. Wright’s films, like *Hot Fuzz* and *Shaun of the Dead* tend to be overtly comedic, include a good quotient of action, and bring an adventure-focused quality to the proceedings. Anderson’s, by contrast, tend to be quieter, more droll pictures, that are certainly funny and have their share of exciting moments, but which find their form in the more reserved, music box sensibilities of Anderson’s oeuvre.

And yet, Wright and Anderson’s films have something very much in common. They both create films where it seems like the world was built to fit their characters, rather than more typical films where the main personalities find themselves struggling in a world that’s indifferent to them or even more commonly, which doesn’t fit them at all. Whether it’s Anderson’s elegant dioramas or Wright’s “everything’s foreshadowing” rube goldberg machines, the environments of these films bend to our heroes, not the other way around, resulting in some wonderfully well-choreographed cinema.

*Baby Driver* is the apotheosis of this tack, brought to bear in the form of car chases, gunfights, and the best jukebox soundtrack this side of the galaxy (and any attendant guardians). Indeed, Marvel Studios’ Guardians is a nice reference point, as both films not only feature countless rockin’ tunes, but also center on roguish but decent young men, holding onto to the last holy artifacts of their mother, finding solace in music and falling in with a rough crowd before deciding to stand for something more. It’s kismet that star Ansel Elgort, who plays the lead (appropriately named “Baby’), is signed on to be the past and future Han Solo in the latest standalone *Star Wars* flick, a character who’s very much in the DNA of Guardians’ Peter “Star-Lord” Quill.

Independent of any comic book counterparts, however, *Baby Driver* doesn’t offer much in terms of an original premise. Baby is a badass driver and a decent kid, mixed up with some bad folks, tentative about the prospect of blood and his hands, wanting to start a new life with his lady love. There are a lot of tropes in the film: the quiet but effective young naif, the loose cannon gangster, the slimy mastermind, the ingenue who represents a beacon of hope, the inevitable moral dilemma.

But what the film lacks in originality in its setup, it more than makes up for in performance, texture, and execution. *Baby Driver* has a murderer’s row of performers who chew up and spit out Wright’s script and make what could otherwise be stock character come alive and compensate for any dearth of depth with the sheer vividness of their presence.

Kevin Spacey looks alive for the first time in ages, bringing a blasé menace as the organizer of each heist. Jamie Foxx is at his extroverted best, rolling through pointed monologues and bringing a lived-in flavor of crazy. Lily James has enough homespun, wanderlust charm to balance out her underwritten part. Elgort is necessarily more reserved, but equally endearing and a fine fulcrum for the movie. And Jon Hamm brings his *Mad Men* practiced-gentility in a fashion that makes him seem like that much monstrous when the scales fall.
But while the performances carry the film in its quieter moments, what sets *Baby Driver* apart is sequence after superlative sequence of breathtaking kinetic cinema. Not content to simply toss in explosive but empty action to keep the heart-pumping, Wright, cinematographer Bill Pope, and editor Paul Machliss create these elegantly constructed set pieces of gorgeous synchronous stunts, twists, and turns, the hum right along with the music, just like the protagonist.

That works whether Baby is blowing the doors off the film’s opening with a series of death-defying terms perfectly sequenced to his backing track. It works when the young man finds himself embroiled in a firefight where surprise shots and returned fire blast back and forth in time with the beat. It works in chases on foot as the rhythmic thump of the tune of the moment matches the energy of pursuers and pursued alike. Even when Baby goes to get coffee, the world moves with him; from the graffiti on the walls to the buskers on the street everything goes where he goes.

In the same way, the film doesn’t so much present action scenes as it does ballets of chrome and octane. *Baby Driver* oozes with style and tempo, knowing how to hold the audience’s attention through great escapes that and close scrapes that keep topping one another, and quieter scenes where the tension comes from sweet interactions juxtaposed with combustive elements, leading the viewer to wonder which will win the day.

It’s also a near perfectly-paced movie. Like a perfect mixtape, Wright knows when to kick things into gear and when to slow things down to let the audience catch its breath before putting his foot on the gas once more. While the film starts to feel a bit overextended at the very end, with the villain creeping into unkillable slasher territory, for the vast majority of its runtime it holds your attention from moment to moment and scene to scene expertly. In that, Wright matches the talents of his protagonist, directing and maneuvering this complex machine like it were a rough-and-tumble ballerina, full of slick thrills and inimitable grace.

He achieves this with a movie, a setting, and a lead character, that each move like clockwork in sync with one another. While *Baby Driver* is neither as quiet or twee as Wes Anderson’s work, it brings with it the film’s own sense of longing and melancholy beneath an intricately constructed world. Every scene is a dance, every moment a confluence of sound and imagery and movement, whether in the pulse-pounding races against cops or robbers, or gauzy imaginings of another life that might be. In *Baby Driver*, Wright has built his most elegant, intricate toy, and it’s a treat and a pleasure to see him play on the screen once again.
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Reply by dgw
6 years ago
@andrewbloom This should have more likes. Why doesn't it have more likes?!
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Reply by AndrewBloom
6 years ago
@dgw Thanks very much! I think I was a little slow on the draw with this one.
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Rob
/10  9 months ago
Like music beats? Like movies? You've never seen the two combined like this before. On the surface, this is an action-heist movie. But look again...with your ears. The visual beats are in time with the soundtrack. It's utterly mesmerising.
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dgood826
/10  6 years ago
This was the most fun I’ve had watching a movie in a long time. It has everything I’m looking for in a summer blockbuster: nonstop action, amazing soundtrack (best soundtrack of the year), and hilariously funny. Oh and it’s an Edgar Wright film which has never been a let down. I’ve never seen the star, Ansel Elgort, in anything before but I know he was in the running to play Han Solo and now I’m extremely sad he didn’t make the cut – he even dresses like Solo for most of the film. Read more of my review here: https://imdgflicks.wordpress.com/2017/06/30/baby-driver-is-the-best-music-video-since-tron-legacy/
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Gimly
/10  6 years ago
Let it never be said that "Overrated" equates to "Bad".

_Final rating:★★★½ - I really liked it. Would strongly recommend you give it your time._
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Reno
/10  6 years ago
**Don't mess with this Baby!**

One of the stylish film of the year. There's nothing special about the story, but the way it was made looks intriguing. The individual characters, music, stunts, obviously car chases. Not the best role Ansel Elgort has ever played, but in his short, beginning of the career, it quite possibly defines he's ready for the tough roles. Then the British filmmaker known for some wonderful action-comedies, one more addition to his hit kit.

A youngster who is a getaway car driver for heists, working under a criminal mastermind, is often teamed with a different crew. One of his latest job takes an unexpected twist, leaving his yet to bloom romance with a waitress in peril. His attempt to come out of that, the risk he takes, changes his life forever. The tale ends with an action packed finale.

This is the first Kevin Spacey film I'm seeing after all the allegation against him. I blame everyone equally who had let him do it all these years. But that's nothing to do with this film. He was fine as an actor as always. It's just fine to be as one-off film, but the way everything had happened looked like it could have been a great franchise. As of latest news, it is on. The sad part is, all the good characters won't return. Anyway, it is one of the must see from the year T17.

_8/10_
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